Animation warning for the link:
With my disabilities, I have trouble with several of their links, and don’t think I can follow any of their suggestions.
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I feel like my hands are tied as well. Showing up to the hearings could be a definite possibility, but it costs $7 and takes 3 hours to get from my front door to the heart of San Diego. I can’t respond more rapidly.
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So this happened:
Now, you might be asking yourself what the hell a knitting site needs an anti-white supremacist policy for. They need it because white supremacist knitters have been derailing forums with white supremacist stuff, plus creating forums for white supremacist stuff, and they shat the bed. Badly.
Understand that, like this forum, while Ravelry is based in the States, it has an international membership. The owners have to keep that in mind when making membership rules.
What I’ve found interesting is that the line between “conservative” and “white supremacist” has been completely blurred at this point.
I can also see that there are a lot of already-banned Trump supporters who still think they’re supporting a “great businessman”, or “Republicans”, and think the policy is extreme and partisan. They really can’t see how far things have gone.
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I’m so glad I’m on Ravelry-- joined it last year!!! As many posters on that Twitter thread posted:
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If you subtract racism, misogyny, etc., from conservatism, what’s left?
Cutting taxes? Balancing the budget? Oh wait, you can’t do both of those at once. So it’s either “cut taxes and let the federal government go bankrupt” and there are factions out there who would applaud this, or else it’s “just pay the bills and keep things simple” which is basically Clintonism.
Without bigotry and cruelty the remaining conservatives are either anarchists or '90s Democrats.
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Well, depends on the conservatives. I grew up in the era of Red Tories and Bill Davis’ Big Blue Machine. That meant pro-business, but also pro-human rights, and patriotism without being hawkish.
So, what is now a right-wing to centrist Canadian Liberal or Democrat.
We used to think that was right-wing. Oh nostalgia.
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I think you just described Elizabeth Warren 
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Karl Hess went from Goldwater Republican to anarchist in the '60s.
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We need to fight to restore the word to its real meaning. For example, I consider myself a conservative, but I find I’m to the left of many Democratic presidential candidates.
And don’t get me started kn the original meaning of “republican!”
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“Conservatism” is supposed to be progressivism, but slower. Steps forward, but at a moderated pace to make sure nothing breaks along the way. Maybe a stop for breath once in a while, and or to take a small step back when something does get broken, but not actually trying to roll back beyond that.
The term has been perverted to mean “reactionary and regressive.”
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I am now the far opposite of a conservative, but I grew up as one and I don’t agree with that. Unfortunately I’m having a difficult time rewinding my mind to what I thought way back then, because it was so different, but I’ll see what I can do.
- Fairness - a conservative ethic is that you get out what you put in because that’s fair. (Thus conservatives arguing against government handouts and such.)
- Equality - people shouldn’t get special treatment because they’re female, or a different skin color, or age demographic or whatever. (This is one that was pretty obviously just viewing things from the wrong angle - some people do need special treatment just to get equality in the first place.)
- Community - you have to work together with those that are in your group so that you can all be successful together. (That does lead into the racism/misogyny thing though since its basically valuing the insiders and devaluing the outsiders.)
- Respect for Elders - our parents and grandparents and so on faced similar challenges in life and found their solutions which worked well enough for them (or else we wouldn’t be here) so we should follow their lead. (Biblical law and Sharia Law and things like that seem to come from here)
- Tradition - if something ain’t broke, don’t try to fix it, there’s a good chance you’ll break it and make it worse. (similar to above)
- Conservativism - tying together these things becomes conserving efforts to focus on us and our needs, not having government agencies or spending money/effort that focuses on people other than us, and our traditional ways of doing things.
I’m sure there was more, but maybe that gives a basic idea of conservative values? I was a fairly libertarian conservative, so maybe not the same for others.
Also to restate, I am far from conservative now and realize a lot of limitations in those ideals, but I’ve been there so I also understand that the ideals are all grounded in good intentions, and they all sound good on the surface. Fairness, equality, community, respect, tradition, conservativism - how could you argue with that?
I can argue with it because of experience. I can also understand that a lot of people haven’t had those experiences, so they just accept it and think it’s right.
ETA: I don’t know what it’s like nowadays, since I saw the real world and flipped years ago. Could be different for modern conservatives.
E (again) TA: My point is that conservatives think that they’re doing what is right and virtuous based on their values. And conceptually, those values do have merit. They’re not inherently evil. It’s just that stuff in the real world is complex, and it gets messy. And the evil villains think all along that they are the heroes. And it makes sense, if they were just following good values.
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Yup, exactly. You can see how small-c conservative can be twisted, depending on how you interpret incongruities like that.
The way I think of it: “special treatment” has to do with systems, such as in the political or employment arenas. “Respect” means you give up your seat on the bus to someone in their 80s, or a pregnant person, or someone who clearly has physical reasons why they need to be sitting for their own safety and stability.
But this does not mean reparations should be considered “special treatment”, for example. Righting a wrong is different.
Basically, I would tweak how it was said:
Equality - people shouldn’t get special treatment because they’re male, or the dominant ethnic or religious group, etc.
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Special treatment doesn’t really exist for most people. Reparations aren’t special treatment. Accommodations for disabilities aren’t special treatment either.
Expecting solicitous treatment from anyone who doesn’t remember the Kennedy assassination is, however.
Respect for elders is basically saying please and thank you and acknowledging their presence and basically being a decent human being, the same you would be to anyone else.
It’s all about how you frame it.
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Yeah, coincidentally, that’s one of the first things that might make a young conservative start questioning those values. It is not the only inconsistency. Someone could write a book.
But that circles back to the real world is messy and complex, and the road to hell is paved with good intentions.
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Baby steps…
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And I bet they’re squealing about “sharia” and “censorship” in full force.
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I’ve often complained knitting out to be more mainstream than it is, given how many people practice it. I mean sheesh, golfers have their TV channels.
Be careful what you wish for.
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